


Fragments of the Soul

by LogicIsGod327



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Derek Hale, Angst, Character Study, Dark Magic, Grief, M/M, Past Character Death, Spark Stiles Stilinski, Suicide, everything hurts and nothing is beautiful, of a sort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-18
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-06-12 08:41:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15336105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LogicIsGod327/pseuds/LogicIsGod327
Summary: Stiles is waiting for the end, for the time to come when his magic will eat him alive, and he prays everyday that it will finally be the day it all comes down around him, because he already died so long ago.





	Fragments of the Soul

**Author's Note:**

> So, I don’t know what happened. I’m sorry, I guess, but there is no happy here. It’s just pain.

He carries him with him, no matter where he goes. The black triskelion tattooed over his heart ensures that, but it’s more than a literal way. Stiles carries the last piece of Derek’s soul still on this earthly world, a small part of him that was bound forever to Stiles, and that would not leave, even when the bond was pulled to its furthest extent and snapped, even as Derek left this world with a sound so soft it might have been the wind. 

Sometimes he hears his voice, in the deep sleep of dreams and the empty nights. Gazing up at Mother Moon, Stiles can feel some infinitely small urge to run, to howl, to claim. He hasn’t shed tears in a long time, even on the anniversary, he does little more than offer a prayer to ancient gods that Derek is well. Perhaps it’s because of that little bit of soul still inside his, perhaps it’s just Stiles’ nature, having felt so much loss that he has no tears left to cry.

Whatever it is, no tears does not mean no pain. The spark within him seems to scream at times, crying out for a connection that was ripped away so violently that it’s a miracle he didn’t go mad with the suddenness of it. Sometimes, he will be reading a book, or just walking the empty streets of New York City when the pain flares, and Stiles is left with a crippling migraine and a desperate attempt to control the magic within him that is clawing its way out.

He can’t continue on forever like this. He’ll go mad, or worse. Magic is temperamental, and his in particular seems to be alternating between grieved and furious. The one who carries the spark is but a vessel for the magic of the old gods, and the magic will happily eat that vessel alive if it wants to. Stiles has made his peace with this, and just carries Derek with him for as long as he can.

He just waits for an end he knows is coming.

-Ω-

_ The moon overheard is full and heavy, and it is not comforting. The whole world is two steps to the left, and the spark in Stiles revolts, uncomfortable with the unnatural and twisted magic that fills the air with a scent like sulfur and death. _

_ “Stiles.” Derek’s voice is clear, shattering the unnatural quiet of the night. “Get your runes ready.” The alpha wolf softly commands. _

_ Ahead, deep in a clearing in the California forest, a mound sits in the moonlight, a writhing pile of human gore and horror that nearly makes Stiles vomit. The limbs of the bodies twitch and shudder, the corpses of no less than fifty people half animate under the powerful magic of a harvest moon. They must stop this. _

_ Stiles nods. “Let’s go.” _

-Ω-

Two years and eight months. It’s been nearly three whole revolutions around the sun since he lost him. Stiles swallows as he feels the spark flicker in irritation. It wants to go home. What’s left of Derek reaches down from the severed wound of the bond and soothes it, just a little bit. He doesn’t know if he’ll make it three years.

The magic of the alpha status had brought out so much of his own abilities, and Derek had no betas left to inherit his status. The magic had crossed the bond just as it broke, leaving that fragment of Derek stuck within his own soul and flooding his mere spark into a full blown forest fire. A forest fire that every day comes closer to burning him down. Deaton has called periodically, asking probing questions, almost as if he’s aware of all the turmoil that rages within Stiles.

He knows that he could offload the magic, but it would mean letting go of Derek. Doing so would finally rip that piece of soul apart from his, and Stiles will not do that. He chooses death, because he died a long time ago, in a forest under a harvest moon three thousand miles away. He chooses death before he finally gives him up.

Cora visits, sometimes. She’s moved upstate, but makes fairly regular trips down the mostly empty Brooklyn brownstone her older siblings lived in what seems like an eternity ago, the one that Stiles now calls his. Stiles has long ago made Cora the main inheritor of the Hale estate, which became his after Derek died. He’s left a tidy few million for his father and some others, but when the times comes, Cora will have over a hundred million dollars to her name.

She never stays long, usually not even a full day, but Stiles treasures her visits more than he wants to admit. They’ve both done a lot more growing up than they should have for people in their early twenties, and it’s soothing to have someone who knows his pain. Derek’s remnants seem lighter, too, when his sister is there. The magic is more easily controlled, and he just feels better. They get lunch, make polite conversation, and usually share a drink in Derek’s memory.

He tells her that he’s dying. That losing Derek has slowly killed him, and will keep doing so. She looks at him with Talia Hale’s eyes in her own face and nods gravely. She tells him she knows, and that’s she’s sorry, and that she loves him. She loves him because he loved her brother, because he gave her a family again, because after Derek lived so much pain, Stiles gave him so much happiness, even if it was all cut too short.

He loves her too. Stiles loves Cora for all those reasons and more, because she is herself, and she is a Hale, and it seems that Stiles and the Hale family have been entwined forever. He loves her because she is the sister he never had, and he urges her to go back, to retake the Hale land and the Hale name, alpha or no. She nods seriously, promising him she’ll at least think about it.

-Ω-

_ The witch isn’t like anything Stiles ever imagined. She isn’t some cackling old woman wearing a funny hat. She’s actually quite beautiful, in a dark, twisted sort of way. Her eyes are as black as the flowing, half-solid shadows that make up her dress and hair, spaced a bit further apart than any human ever would have. She is pale, her skin tinted ever so slightly green, more like a mint than some obnoxious, Margaret Hamilton-esque emerald. _

_ She smiles at them indulgently, and her voice echoes through multiple sets of vocal chords. “You’re out of your depth, little spark.” She taunts. _

_ “Ignore her, Stiles.” Derek growls out. “She’s just trying to get you off your game.” _

_ He nods, feeling Mother Moon high above, and calls on Her energy, the covenant he made with Her and Derek flowing into him. He has this. _

_ The witch’s confidant smirk falters into something more determined as she senses the power that flows through him, the spark and the alpha mate status rendering them magical equals. Stiles doesn’t even verbalize the magic as he draws from the white light of the moon and the strength within his core. Ruins carve themselves into the grass around him, and the bodies begin to twitch in response. _

_ One corpse looks up at him, its eyes glazed over, and it lets out a noise that comes from somewhere deep in its chest, a rattling, rotted wheeze that propels flecks of brownish blood across its blue, half-decayed lips. _

_ With disturbing speed for a body that’s on the wrong side of putrefaction, the wight is up and scrambling towards them with another terrible snarl. Derek meets the thing halfway, breaking its legs at the knees and then twisting at its head, decapitating the zombie with a vile display of rotten tissue and brown, oxygen starved blood. _

_ Across the clearing, the witch floats into the air, smiling serenely as she does. _

_ “Is that all?” She asks haughtily. _

_ Nearby, dozens more bodies begin to snarl and twitch, pulling themselves to their feet. Stiles draws his spark up into his mind, and prepares for the fight. _

 

-Ω-

The flight back is too long, and makes the spark within him twitchy. More than once, Stiles runs to the lavatory to center himself before some magical mishap can send the plane crashing to the ground. The sliver of Derek is getting weaker, and can no longer soothe the aggrieved spark as he once could. Stiles splashes his face with water, muttering in Greek and Latin at himself, desperately trying to contain the magic within, if only for a little while longer.

He promises the thing it’ll be over soon, and that seems to do the trick. The last leg of the flight goes smoothly, and he touches down at San Francisco International with a sense of purpose. Realizing it’ll be his last time doing so, Stiles orders a Frappuccino from Starbucks, and loads into his rental car for the drive down to Beacon Hills.

The closer he gets to the damned place, the calmer the spark seems. When the woods of Beacon County become familiar, both the magic and Derek start to reach out longingly for the forests they know to be home. Stiles grits his teeth, hating every second of it, and is clipping eighty miles per hour when he passes the sign that reads ‘ _ Now Entering Beacon Hills’ _ .

He slows down as he catches sight of the first buildings at the edge of town, and follows the winding street patterns to a familiar brick McMansion, and sees an equally familiar Tesla parked in the driveway. Extending a precious little amount of magic to see if anyone else is there, Stiles is relieved when there isn’t.

He parks the car on the side of the road, and walks up the steps, knocking on dark brown door, and waits. The padding of feet down stairs reaches his ears, and a soft voice says that she’ll be there in a minute. Sure enough, a few moments later, Lydia Martin opens the door, and outright gasps when she sees him leaning against a column on her portico.

In the three years since Stiles left, she’s changed a lot. Her hair, which he had so enjoyed waxing poet about in those foolish younger years, is now a chestnut brown, reaching nearly the small of Lydia’s back. She doesn’t have a full face of makeup, but instead only wears a clear gloss and some eyeliner. The grey long sleeve, asymmetrical dress she wears is form fitting, and reveals the gentle slope of her stomach. She’s pregnant.

Before she can even process, a toddler with brilliant green eyes and sandy blonde hair is peering up at him with curiosity, asking his mother who the man on their porch is. She bends down, pressing a kiss to the little boy’s head and gently pushing him back towards the living room. Stiles’ throat thickens immensely when she hears what she named him. Lydia named her firstborn son Derek.

Facing him again, without a word, she sweeps him into a tight hugging, burying her face in the crook of his neck. He responds in kind, pulling her as close as he dares in her state. She leads him into the kitchen, and Stiles catches sight of a wall of photographs detailing the last three years he’s missed. Featured most prominently is a photo of Lydia beaming in a white gown, wrapped up in the arms of none other than Jordan Parrish, who himself looks dashing in a tuxedo.

She makes him sit at the island in the middle of the kitchen as she leans against the opposite side. In an instant, he feels seventeen again, on those days when the two of them would sit at this very same marble counter and pour over spells and evidence and the Hale bestiary, with Derek and Jordan talking strategy in the next room over.

She asks if he’s come home to live again, or if this is just a visit. He shakes his head, looking up at her with tears flossing his whiskey-colored eyes. He hasn’t come home to live, he’s come home to die. He tells her honestly, how he’s carried Derek with him from the moment of his death, and how it has drained him, worn away his control and his health until it will finally come home. It’s the harvest moon tonight, and he cannot hold it out any longer.

Lydia weeps into his arms, and begs him not to go, but Stiles presses his lips to her forehead and simply shakes his head. He’s resolved to death. She asks about his father, and Stiles forces himself to lie through his teeth. He tells her he’s already said goodbye, that she is the last stop, which is true, because he needs someone to impart the knowledge he’s collected on.

Running out to the rental, Stiles pulls a great wooden trunk out of the back seat. The old thing is sealed with strong magic, and loaded with the last surviving books of the Hale library. Among them are the bestiary, Talia Hale’s personal diary, a history of werewolves in North America, and a collection of essays from an eleventh century Druid in Constantinople. There is also his own personal spellbook, and dozens of notebooks filled with his scrawl on various topics from growing magical herbs to astronomy. He knows Lydia has her own pool of magic, and he knows how valuable this material will be to her.

He stays a little while longer, watching little Derek play with his toys as he and Lydia catch up, but the day is growing short, and he must go. She begs him to stay, to go see Deaton, but he shakes his head. He’s ready. There is a final, tearful goodbye, an exchange of I-love-yous, and he is out the door into the late afternoon sun.

He drives through the heart of town, taking it all in one last time. His father’s cruiser is parked outside of the station, and, for a brief moment, Stiles feels the draw to run in and wrap himself in his father’s arms like a child, but he quashes the instinct. He drives on to the cemetery, and stops at his mother’s grave. He says nothing, only conjures a single orchid to grow from the ground. Claudia loved orchids, especially blue ones. The sapphire bloom stands in stark display to the stunning reds and oranges of autumn, and Stiles smiles gently at it as he walks away.

With a wave of his hand, he unlocks the Hale crypt, and slips inside. The white marble interior is beautiful, lit only by the light that streams through the smoky windows and the open door. Stiles walks through to the back, running his hand along the wall of the columbaria, feeling the names and essences of the Hale ancestors as he does.

Finally, he reaches a second room, this one filled with sarcophagi. Each is identical, made of a deep blue hecatolite, with a triskelion embossed in on the lid. The only differences are in the names. This room is for the Hale alphas and their mates. The alphas’ sarcophagi are distinguished from their mates by a small circle at the foot of the lid, so subtle you could barely tell it was there without meaning to.

Stiles reads each name, walking from one end to the other. The oldest is covered in a thin layer of dust, but it still legible. It reads  _ ‘Anthony Thomas Hale, 1668-1743’ _ . Finally, he reaches Derek’s. Inside are the mortal remains of the man he loved, the man he still loves, and who still lives in his soul.  _ ‘Derek Stephen Hale, 1995-2023’ _

The one next to it is the most recent, and unlabeled. Stiles pulls a bit more from his weary spark, and forces the words to appear within its azure surface. It reads,  _ ‘Genim Daniel Stilinski-Hale, 2000-2026’,  _ and it satisfies him. It feels like enough. It feels like finality.

-Ω-

_ The wights just don’t stay dead. Anything less than tearing them to irreparable shreds just does not work. Stiles is fairly certain he’s killed this one at least four times now. Frustrated, covered in gore, and growing tired, he lets the spark lash out, releasing his tenuous controls on the magic within him in favor of just getting this mess cleaned up. _

_ “Amateurs, really.” The witch chuckles from her vantage point above them. “Losing control is dangerous, little spark.” _

_ Stiles snarls. “God, do you ever shut up?!” He demands, firing a lance of pure magic directly at her. _

_ This seems to get her attention, as she is on the two of them seemingly instantly, deflecting the magic with ease. The witch grabs his throat, and lifts, floating away with him. _

_ “So much bravery, for such a fragile boy.” She growls into his face. “Let’s see how you do against something a little more… fundamental.” _

_ The witch levitates them both above the treeline, choking Stiles all the way as she does, before a wicked grin crosses her inhuman face, and she lets go. He plummets like a rock, barely able to even think, let alone formulate a spell to protect himself as he does. As Stiles prepares for the end to come and to become little more than a stain on a rock outcropping, he’s being swept into the arms of his mate. _

_ “Gotcha!” Derek grunts, having lept high into the air to catch him. The two come to earth on the opposite side of the clearing, staring at each other for the briefest of moments, before Stiles presses his lips to Derek’s. _

_ He leans his forehead against the wolf’s. “Thank you.” He whispers. _

_ As they go to pull apart, there is a sound of fabric and flesh ripping, and the wet deluge of blood against the forest floor. The two men look down at the shadowy protrusion that has ripped its way through Derek’s heart, an unnatural construct made of the same material that surrounds the sorceress, and Stiles can feel the agony Derek feels across the mate bond. _

_ “St-” The alpha goes to say, but no more. The weapon dissolves into smoke, and Derek slumped to the ground. The bond unravels, but Stiles presses across his, trying to force Derek to stay alive. He is half caught between the world of the living and the world of the dead, and he can see figures in a sunlit clearing, can hear birdsong, can feel the breeze that carries across the entire scene. Clinging to whatever he can of Derek, Stiles is ripped out of the other side, and the feeling of magic flooding his spark is like drinking magma. _

_ The overload of power makes itself known in a blinding flash, one that knocks down trees and burns away the grass. In an instant, the witch, her wights, all of it, is gone. Stiles is left alone with nothing else but the corpse of the one he loves in his arms. The noise that rips its way out of his throat is more animal than human, and even he is stunned by the power behind the sheer roar of grief that echoes into the empty sky. The harvest moon looks down on death and destruction and little else. _

-Ω-

The last streams of evening sun fill the clearing. Stiles has finally reached the end. Being here, the spark is truly happy for the first time in three years. He’s truly happy, too. Even the shard of Derek’s soul within his is happy. Where once it looked like a bomb had gone off, the jagged ground has been smoothed into gentle rolls, and the entire clearing is filled with brilliant violet stalks of wolfsbane that grow everywhere.

The place is beautiful. Stiles wades through the grove, feeling the deadly flowers graze against his skin and the poison seep into his blood. He reaches the place where it happened, where Derek was taken from him, and lies down among the flowers. The magic still hums here, and the  essence of his fallen lover lingers in this place. Stiles inhales deeply, filling his nose with the heavy, almost lilac-like scent of the poisonous blooms. His head swims, and his body becomes heavy and clumsy. The last thought that echoes through Stiles’ mind is only this:

_ ‘Finally.’ _

-Ω-

They find him the next day. Lydia knew exactly where he would go to die, and she places the call, claiming to have discovered him there on a morning hike. The official cause of death is aconite poisoning, although there are signs of serious strain and aging that the coroner cannot make heads or tails of. It’s as though someone placed a twenty six year old’s skin over the body of someone twice his age. Nonetheless, the death of Stiles Stilinski-Hale is ascribed as a tragic accident.

The funeral is a moving affair, with everyone from the old days in attendance. The Sheriff weeps into Melissa’s arms as the pastor drones on about how Stiles is reunited with his lost husband, and how he is free of grief and pain. Scott can only stare at the rowan wood coffin with numbness in his eyes, unable to speak, or cry, or even process the fact that his best friend is gone. Danny, Jackson, Isaac, and Chris all journey from across the globe to pay their respects, and Peter and Cora sit in the very front row as well. Deaton sits in the middle of the crowd, unassuming in his position, as per his preference.

Afterwards, the family is invited into the Hale crypt to watch as Stiles is moved from the casket into his sarcophagus. He’s so perfectly preserved it’s as though he is asleep, and a black gossamer veil is laid over his form inside the velvet-lined tomb. The room is silent, spare the sliding of the lid over the opening, and the thing being hammered shut. The cemetery employees respectfully shuffle out, leaving them alone to offer their final respects.

As the autumn sun shines overhead, Stiles’ loved ones finally leave the tomb, and silence falls once more. Yet, from somewhere, in a place where it is always summer, and where the moon is always full and welcoming, laughter echoes, or perhaps it is only the wind.

**Author's Note:**

> If you liked this, you’re a masochistic fuck, but I’m glad nonetheless. Hopefully I’ll write something happier next time, but who knows. Kudos and review this shit, it provides me with validation. Cheers!


End file.
